Posted on 06/16/2010 2:32:22 PM PDT by fathers1
Wrath of a woman scorned? You betcha!
It took Tonya Craft less than two weeks to sue her accusers - all of them - after she was acquitted on all counts of sexual molestation of children in her kindergarten class. Read about it here (The Chattanoogan, 5/24/10). I wrote about the acquittal here.
Up until May 19, 2008, Tonya Craft had been a kindergarten teacher for years and with a spotless record. Teaching youngsters was her career, her life, and from all accounts, she was good at it. Not any more.
That’s because on May 19, 2008, the accusations started. Weirdly enough, the original accusations weren’t of Craft, but of her pre-school age daughter. One little girl was reported to have touched - and been touched by - Craft’s daughter. Specifically, they were touching each other’s genitals, the way children do sometimes. Later, another child in Craft’s class wrote “sex and kissing” on the sidewalk in chalk.
If none of that sounds like the end of civilization as we know it, you’re just not a parent at Craft’s school. Parents started questioning their children in the leading, suggestive, won’t-take-no-for-an-answer way of Grand Inquisitors since time immemorial. Determined to get incriminating information, they succeeded in cajoling the kids into saying Craft had touched them inappropriately.
Enter a multitude of sheriff’s deputies and child advocates who, when the children said, “My mommy told me to say this” ignored them completely. In short, what the parents, police and child advocates allegedly did was what was done in the pre-school sex abuse hysteria of the 1980s; they kept questioning the children until the kids knuckled under and gave them the answers they wanted. They then took those patently false answers and ruined someone’s life with them.
What was unconscionable in the 80s is doubly so now. That’s because protocols for questioning small children in cases of alleged sexual abuse have been developed. According to Craft’s lawsuit and according to expert testimony at her criminal trial, those protocols were ignored by everyone in their headlong rush to destroy Tonya Craft.
It was those protocols that helped to get Tonya Craft acquitted; experts testified that those protocols had been abandoned, which doubtless had an effect on the jury. And with that nightmare behind her, she’s embarked on a lawsuit in federal court to make her accusers pay. She’s sued parents, she’s sued school officials, sheriff’s department officials, two child advocacy agencies and numerous individual therapists and hangers on. She’s seeking $25 million in damages. She’s also demanding a court order requiring the county to establish appropriate protocols for handling future allegations.
This is one to watch. I’ve written before about people like William Dunn in Florida whose civil suit against that state’s child protective agency is coming to trial this October. They kept his child from him for over a year under truly outrageous circumstances.
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: civil suits for damages are made for situations like these. False accusers need to know that they don’t act with impunity, even if they do work for the state. They need to understand that allegations like those against Tonya Craft can destroy a person’s life, and therefore must be made only after responsible investigation that produces probable cause.
Protecting children is a fine and necessary thing, but it doesn’t excuse a witch hunt. It shouldn’t come with a price tag that reads “Our Constitutional Rights.”
I hope this woman ends up owning that town.
**I hope this woman ends up owning that town.**
Ditto... I’m watching a fried go thru this... it’s not pretty!!
This whole situation is horrible and I agree, I hope she owns the town.
Way to go mom and dad, teach your children to lie to at such a young age......shame on those adults.....
Just like the McMartin case ...
Me too.
That's the only salvation I can think of regarding old Mike Wallace.....he totally exploded the silliness of that case on Sixty Minutes.
Tonya Craft?
Is that the company that built the FailBoat for that reality show girly?
Good.
Thou shalt not conjure false witness against thy neighbor.
Anybody remember the Wenatchee, WA “sex ring” case? Same sort of stuff, maybe worse. Eventually the accused sued the city and won. Several lives were already ruined though.
http://www.historylink.org/index.cfm?DisplayPage=output.cfm&File_Id=7065
I am pleased to see this outcome.
She fought the case, in court, the AMERICAN WAY, and won.
Now she can make those who CONSPIRED TO FILE FALSE CHARGES pay.
I’m with you
During my divorce the Mother Protection agency- oops I mean child protective services was presented with the following:
1) Child playing unsuprvised on swingset - found hanging by her neck (Filed against Mother by neighbor who saved her)
2) Children playing in street where semi-trucks travel (against mother by neighborS )
3) Child hospitalized from neglect and diaper rash so severe she was bleeding and infected- needed surgery (against mother by hospital)
4) Child missed surgery because they were unsupervised and ate a stick of butter -because no food in the house. (against mother by doctors ofice)
5) Children called father to report they had no food and were starving (against mother by police report)
6) Children (all little girls) covered in bug bites from sleeping on filthy floor (filed against mother by father only AFTER judge said “it must not be child abused if father did not file a complaint” with CPS)
7) FIVE seperate incidents of child coming home with diaper rash so severe she was bleeding
8) Child slapped (filed against FATHER by mother, 2 days after court doctor recommended she not have custody due to mental illness and children were placed with father)
Guess which one caused CPS to rush into action and say “we are going to put the children with their mother until we complete our investigation”
This is AFTER her older boy was removed from her by CPS after 14 (FOURTEEN!!!!) seperate incidents in another town (before I met here- i never knew until the trial) Including being left unsupervised with a dog that ripped his face open
Oh and guess who the Judge awarded custody to? (Hint: she was DIAGNOSED by the JUDGES OWN COURT-APPOINTED DOCTOR AS A PSYCHOPATH (Borderline Personality Disorder- look it up)
Enough to make you grab your shotgun and clean house. Yes, I’m serious.
Unreal!
Unfortunately, I know it’s all too real.
How does one decide to marry a psychopath? Or, how does one decide to marry one they know so little about that they could be an undetected psychopath?
I know, I know...There were never even the slightest hints of anything potentially wrong with her prior to marriage...
I’m so sorry but not surprised. And to anyone who reads and thinks you are exaggerating has not had the misfortune of dealing with CPS on any level!
None.
Sadly, the uninvolved taxpayer foots the bill. What needs to happen is the removal of sovereign immunity. Sovereign immunity may make sense for jobs related to job security and matters of the state (police, fire, emergency, etc), but all these social services have been traditionally the work of the private sector and charity. These SEIU types get overpaid and overprotected. They have an unfair advantage over the private sector.
Take those liars to the cleaners.
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